N.O.V.A. - Near Orbit Vanguard Alliance
By Gameloft
View More By This DeveloperOpen iTunes to buy and download apps.
Description
NEWLY UPGRADED FOR iPHONE 4 with optimized graphics for the Retina display & gyroscope support for innovative controlling and aiming precision.
---------------------------------------------
If you have customized the game interface in the previous version, please reset it to be able to play with gyroscope.
During a game session, go to Pause > Controls > Customize > Reset
---------------------------------------------
**IGN - Best Action Game of the Year: "A slam-bang action game that draws a new line in the sand"
**Pocket Gamer - 9/10 + Gold Award: "Extraordinarily polished gameplay and high production values guarantee a blast"
**Touch Arcade: " One of the most ambitious iPhone games I've played so far"
The most revolutionary sci-fi FPS for your iPhone & iPod Touch!
Join the fight for mankind's survival against the aggressive aliens known as Judges in this immersive space opera.
With Earth no longer able to sustain life, huge artificial satellites called “near-orbitals” were constructed for people to live on. To protect themselves, the near-orbitals banded together to form N.O.V.A., the Near Orbit Vanguard Alliance. Now, a strange threat has emerged from the darkness of space. A Marine ship, reported missing just a week ago, has suddenly reappeared and is headed directly for the near-orbitals, ignoring all communications. Against his will, retired Marine hero Kal Wardin is forcefully returned to active duty to prevent mankind's annihilation.
Plunge into an unparalleled gaming experience!
EPIC SINGLE-PLAYER CAMPAIGN
- 13 insane levels
- 5 radically different environments, from the real to the fantasic - jungle, snow mountains, spaceship, bunker, and an alien city
- 6 weapons: Assault rifle, shotgun, sniper rifle, handgun, rocket launcher and plasma gun – plus grenades & machine gun turrets in certain levels
- An intense drama sustained by transitional cinematics and character voices
FRANTIC MULTIPLAYER MODE
- Play locally or online via Wi-Fi or Local Bluetooth connection
- 1-4 player Deathmatch (1-2 players via Bluetooth connection)
- 5 different maps
- Play against your friends or the entire world through Gameloft LIVE!
- Worldwide leaderboards in the game & on the official website, www.near-orbit-vanguard-alliance.com
TECHNOLOGICAL LEAP
- Full 3D rendered environments enhanced by highly detailed graphics
- 4 control schemes
- Customizable interface
N.O.V.A., the Near Orbit Vanguard Alliance, wants you to support the fight!
Enlist on Twitter @NOVA_fps
Visit www.near-orbit-vanguard-alliance.com for more information.
What's New In Version 1.2.1
Updated for iPhone 4 and iOS 4
- New gyroscopic control mode with complete 3D range added
- Crisp & gorgeous high-resolution graphics to take full advantage of the iPhone 4 Retina Display
- Support for iOS 4 multitasking on compatible devices: switch between your favorite apps instantly
Customer Reviews
Almost a perfect Halo Clone
Everyone is aware of the huge hype surrounding N.O.V.A. But is it really worth it?
First off, let's talk about the one thing devs have had trouble with on touch platforms: The controls. Gameloft did a nice job with them in NOVA, as they are responsive and well organized. I LOVE that you can manually customize the position of the on-screen buttons, and I have to ask other devs why they haven't included that (it's the first I've seen it on the iTouch platform). That being said, I wish you could adjust the sensitivity of the controls, especially while sniping - it's very jerky and difficult to aim when zoomed in. Other than that, the controls are pretty flawless.
Graphics are, in a word, gorgeous. The landscapes are varied and contain lots of detail. For the most part levels keep you on a predetermined path, but you're free to roam about the level and explore. Character models are on the low-poly side, but they're still nicely detailed and smoothly animated. Framerate is excellent on my iTouch 2G, as it was able to render even the largest of maps with nary a stutter.
The single player campaign is fairly generic, taking you across 15 missions that take between 10 and 20 minutes to complete. It's a nice length, and the addition of (albeit cheesy) voice acting and scripted cut scenes add a level of depth to this game that's missing from other games on this platform. You can ignore the storyline if you want, but it's nice to see it included and it does make it feel like a more complete package than something like Modern Combat, whose story was functional at best. NOVA actually has characters and a mission, so you don't feel like you're just running through corridors blasting anything that moves for no reason.
The weapons are your standard sci-fi fare, and while they all work perfectly well and look very nice, they leave me wanting a little bit more. I understand that NOVA is intended to be a Halo clone, but some weapons (particularly the rocket launcher and pistol) look and function like they were copy-pasted directly from Halo, and it would be nice to see a little creativity in this department.
Also: Where is the melee attack? Bashing enemies is a staple not just in Halo, but in most action/adventure and first person shooter games in general. MC:S has it, and it seems like a pretty glaring omission in a game where two of the most common enemies run right at you and attack you point blank. When an enemy jumps out and tries to eat my face off, my first reaction is to bash it, not to fumble around for my shotgun. It seems like a small detail to complain about but I found myself really missing this ability throughout the single player campaign. Please Gameloft, PLEASE add this in a future update!
The real question on everyone's mind is multiplay. Eliminate seems to be the multiplayer standard everyone compares first person shooters too, but I'd say NOVA is a different type of multiplay. Eliminate is to Quake III What NOVA is to... well, Halo multiplay. I miss the RPG elements from Eliminate, but again, it's a different style of game. In Eliminate, the focus is on leveling up your character. In NOVA, everyone starts off with an assault rifle and pistol, so the playing field is equal for everyone.
So far Gameloft has only included 5 maps and only one game mode - deathmatch - so I hope to see more content available in the future. This type of game is crying out for team deathmatch and capture the flag, and it would be nice to see more than a 4 player limit per game, since some of the maps are pretty big and feel a little empty. Additionally, a random-match quickplay mode is desperately needed, as you can't modify any game settings beyond the killl limit, time limit and map, so browsing through the list of available games is pretty irrelevant. Gameloft also needs to let you password protect private games so you can play 1 on 1 with a friend.
The leaderboard, limited right now to kills and total score, could use some more detail as well. The game collects stats on headshots, for instance - why not throw that on the leaderboard rankings as well? Rank players by weapon use, death stats, killstreaks, etc- the game records all this information, so why not put it up there? It seems like this would be very easy to implement and would add a lot of competitive replay value to the game.
One last gripe - some games don't have a time limit on them, or have no kill limit and the time limit is an hour long, and if you quit a game your stats don't get recorded. I'm assuming this is a bug, but it's annoying to rack up 40 kills only to have my game interrupted and then lose all my stats.
All in all, this game is almost perfect. While it certainly doesn't do anything we haven't seen before, it does everything very well and is a lot of fun to play. It's also a pioneer in the first person shooter genre on iPhone that attempts to craft an engaging storyline, which I really appreciate. It feels like a more complete video game than lots of other titles, and well worth the $6.99 asking price. If Gameloft adds a few more features and polishes up the multplay, then this game really would be perfect and worthy of 5 stars. For now, 4 out of 5.
Halo in my pocket makes me happy.
Fun, fast, slick, smooth -- I've been waiting for this one, and it has delivered on the hype and promise. Looks, sounds, and plays great.
WOW
Must Buy!!! Amazing graphics, smooth gameplay, better than any other FPS out there!!! Plus the multiplayer actaully works really well. Great great great game.
-
$4.99
- Category: Games
- Updated:Jul 21, 2010
- Current Version:1.2.1
- 1.2.1 (iOS 4.0 Tested)
- 205 MB
- Languages:English, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Spanish
- Seller:Gameloft S.A.
- © 2009 Gameloft. All rights reserved. Gameloft, the Gameloft logo and N.O.V.A. Near Orbit Vanguard Alliance are trademarks of Gameloft in the U.S. and/or other countries. SF Quartzite typeface designed by Derek Vogelpohl (http://www.shyfoundry.com).
Requirements:Compatible with iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad. Requires iPhone OS 3.0 or later.
